The Challenge: Severely injured trauma patients face intense pain and high opioid exposure, increasing their risk for long-term complications. While alternative pain management strategies are recommended, standard options like regional nerve blocks are often impractical for multi-injury patients.

The Potential Solution: Low-dose intravenous (IV) ketamine is a promising, safety-conscious option to reduce opioid reliance, but definitive data on its use in critically ill trauma patients is lacking.

The Study (KLOE Trial): This single-center, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial evaluates 140 adult trauma patients. Patients receive either a 48-hour low-dose ketamine infusion or a placebo within 12 hours of ICU admission, alongside standard pain protocols.

Data collection is complete. The team is currently cleaning data and finalizing analyses before publishing the results to ensure transparency.

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